Imitation

Ilya Korolev is the most ordinary nineteen-year-old conservatory student. He has a best friend, a beloved girlfriend, close family, and familiar hobbies. Above all, he values music and his hours at the piano—though he also understands, realistically, that he’ll probably never reach the level of a true virtuoso. His calm routine is disrupted only by two old shadows: a childhood fear after, one day, he got lost in a mirror maze at an amusement park, and the pain of his father’s disappearance—who never returned.

Everything changes when Ilya случайly comes across a candy with a mysterious inscription on the inside of its wrapper. From that moment on, reality begins to glitch: one strange coincidence pulls another along, and the feeling of his own life gradually starts to feel чужой. Ilya grows increasingly certain that he is not who he thought he was—that he is only playing a role that has already been assigned. The nightmares grow worse, and his mother and sister behave as though something is wrong with him. Can he endure it and accept the truth that’s more frightening than any dream?

«Imitation» is an unusual blend of a coming-of-age novel and a psychological thriller: anxious, at times almost dreamlike, yet disturbingly convincing. You are not the person you seem to be.